From the Begining

I've been putting off writing this post.  It's loaded in many ways and I've been confused about how to get the words out.  Why the Pixie project?  Why hair?  Why is this important to me?  As I write out those questions I realize I should have written this post from the get go.  I keep saying I would share my heart and here we are two weeks from the end and I'm just now sitting down to have this chat.  My apologies.

What's my Identity?

Perhaps getting a pixie seems silly or trivial (when, lets be real -- compared to the real day-to-day lives of the women at risk, it is both silly and trivial).  Perhaps you can't quite make a connection of what it could possibly have to do with women at risk in Africa.  But here is what it boils down to for me: What is my identity?

As a woman on this planet, and even more so now as I explore being a "fashion blogger," I feel myself getting wrapped up into a false reality of what is true, noble, right, pure and lovely.  A million quadtrillion (yes, that is a real number) times a day I am bombarded with messages that lure me into calculating how I measure up.  Am I mom enough? Am I professional enough? Am I creative enough?  Am I woman enough?  If you are a female reading this you get it.  I'm preaching to the choir.  

I like to hide behind a facade that I'm poised & unaffected.  But what if I couldn't hide?  What if I did something that would cause me to evaluate the foundations of who I am? You see, this is why I've never gotten a pixie -- because I have this fear that I'll wake up each morning with a sour attitude based simply on the fact that I don't like my hair.  This is not okay with me.  Am I that affected by my hair?  I am.  I am because for far too long I've fed into the lies that long hair gives me the power -- that with long hair I can be more feminine and do all the tricks from pinterest and look like the celebrities and twirl it around my finger when I'm nervous or hide behind my bangs when I don't want to interact.  I give my hair way too much power.  It's a defense mechanisim.  It's one that if I clung to the truth of who God made me to be, I wouldn't need.  

So I look at this issue in my life.  Then I look at these women in Africa who are entrenched in the sex industry.  I look at women who don't even have the freedom to question what makes them feminine or feel beautiful.  They have no one feeding truth into their lives.  They have no identity other than the one that is forced on them by men who do not love them.  And so the Pixie Project grew...  

Because I am able to question and challenge my identity and because there are women who cannot -- this is the heart.  That while I seek for God to reveal more of Himself to me by stripping myself of comforts I've previously hidden behind, I can in turn empower other women to afford the same reality --  that they are loved and their identity does not lie in the hands of men, it comes from above.  

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I set out to raise enough money to take 3 women off the street and support them through an intensive year of rehabilitation.  That total was $1,200.  The good news is that we reached that goal (I'm definitely getting my hair cut).  But the GREAT news is that there are still two weeks left in August and there are more women we can help find identity.  As of this morning we have rasied $1,449!! We did three, we're half way to fully supporting a 4th... in the next two weeks lets fully support 5 women!  

New goal: Will you help me bring the Pixie Project total to $2,000?  

5 women off the streets.  5 women's lives changed.

disclaimer:  long hair ≠ bad & short hair ≠ good or vice versa